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After the general "PTR isn't final" explanations from last week, Blizzard are getting into some fine detail on what the next PTR build will bring for some classes and what motivated those design decisions.

As we mentioned before, the next PTR build will have a fairly substantial number of new class changes. We wanted to provide some insight into our goals and strategy with these changes, particularly for the specs that have seen the most change. Note that one of our overarching goals with Patch 7.1.5 is to increase talent diversity by making some of the less popular talents more attractive, which may open up new styles of play and new ways to approach different situations for all specializations, not just those we've listed here.

Protection Warrior:
While Protection’s performance is still solid, we want to provide Revenge a clearer role in the live rotation, and eliminate the need for an off-GCD ability (Focused Rage) to deal damage. To address both of these problems, Revenge is made into a higher-damage ability, which is used rotationally with its usual activation proc, but can also be used outside of that proc by spending Rage. This eliminates the need for Focused Rage. Thunder Clap will fill the role of a second Rage generator, and be used regularly while tanking. Also of note is a new talent that allows you to adopt a more open playstyle if you prefer, by making your auto attacks trigger Devastates automatically, rather than fitting it into open spaces in your rotation.

Survival Hunter:
Survival's most notable addition is some new gameplay for traps. As all Hunters will once again have traps in 7.1.5, we want to make sure that Survival still feels like the master of traps. In particular, we want to restore the concept of baiting enemies into traps, as opposed to merely dropping them at their feet for an immediate effect. A new Survival passive will grant all your traps an added effect if an enemy is led into the trap after it is placed, encouraging you to anticipate the movement of an enemy, or coordinate with your tank in group content. Talents further enhance this, allowing you to increase the bonus in situations where you can reliably make use of it, or to use a new effect on Steel Trap to singlehandedly eliminate enemies who walk into it of their own accord.

Marksmanship Hunter:
We agree with players that Marksmanship currently relies far too much on Patient Sniper not only to do good damage, but also to make the rotation feel fun and rewarding. As such, we’re changing baseline Vulnerability to essentially bake in Patient Sniper, and adding a new Patient Sniper talent in its place. We are also adjusting some talents to allow for more diversity within talent rows and reflect the change to the base rotation. In particular, the Level 100 row: while Sidewinders was commonly used in all situations for its effects on the rotation, we’d rather the base rotation felt fluid on its own, and Sidewinders was a talent focused on the wide-area cleave that is its most clear purpose. Among other changes to help with this, Marked Shot no longer requires the targets to have Vulnerable to do strong damage, so builds without Sidewinders will be able to use it more effectively.

Shadow Priest:
Shadow’s overall pacing is being adjusted so that the highest peak is at the end of Voidform, rather than just before the start of the next one. As a part of this, Lingering Insanity is removed, but overall Insanity generation (and therefore Voidform uptime) is increased. Additionally, Mind Sear is replaced with a new passive effect that allows Mind Flay to fulfill the same purpose. Shadow already has significant multi-target gameplay from the desire to maintain two damage-over-time effects on each target (a process which being is made smoother by allowing Void Bolt to extend DoTs on multiple targets at once). Finally, we are continuing to tweak the Insanity decay rate in Voidform, and the strength of Surrender to Madness, to better balance the Level 100 row. We want to preserve the purpose and strengths of Surrender to Madness for players who enjoy it, without it being quite so ubiquitous as it is currently.

Arcane Mage:
Arcane is receiving several significant talent changes, to increase talent diversity and move away from some of the more problematic gameplay centered around Quickening. In addition to a new Arcane-specific shield to replace Ice Barrier, there are few utility updates not yet on the PTR: Presence of Mind will be baseline for all Arcane Mages, and a new talent will be added that allows Arcane Missiles to be channeled while moving.

Fire Mage:
While Fire was mostly in a good place, we’re looking at two related issues in 7.1.5; the degree to which critical strike dominates other stats, and the overly high amount of damage concentrated into Combustion. Focusing on critical strike’s very strong contribution to the damage of Combustion, as well as that of Pyretic Incantation, addresses both of these. We'll be adjusting the damage of Fire’s core spells to leave its total damage similar to what it was before these changes. We're also giving Fire its own element-themed shield, as with Arcane.

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I just threw up a little when I read the Shadow Priest changes. It's like they don't even play the class.

4 hours ago, Starym said:

Shadow’s overall pacing is being adjusted so that the highest peak is at the end of Voidform, rather than just before the start of the next one.

The pacing already peaks out at the end of Voidform. It just plateaus until you enter the next one.

4 hours ago, Starym said:

Mind Sear is replaced with a new passive effect that allows Mind Flay to fulfill the same purpose.

Except the new version doesn't. In order for it to spread damage you need both VT and SW:P up on the target, setting you back 2 GCDs compared to live. Additionally, it does not generate extra Insanity per target hit the way Mind Sear does.

4 hours ago, Starym said:

Shadow already has significant multi-target gameplay from the desire to maintain two damage-over-time effects on each target (a process which being is made smoother by allowing Void Bolt to extend DoTs on multiple targets at once).

This might be true if VB actually extended the duration for longer than its cooldown. It also significantly hurst our damage in spread cleave (Odyn P1) encounters. The unmentioned side effect of this is that it's now entirely possible for DoTs to drop off during Voidform when using Void Torrent or when using Dispersion to pause the effects of Voidform.

4 hours ago, Starym said:

Finally, we are continuing to tweak the Insanity decay rate in Voidform, and the strength of Surrender to Madness, to better balance the Level 100 row. We want to preserve the purpose and strengths of Surrender to Madness for players who enjoy it, without it being quite so ubiquitous as it is currently.

As long as the other 2 talents on that row retain the usefulness of an air conditioner at the north pole, Surrender will remain a 100% pick talent for top Shadow Priests. Yes, it needs a nerf, but the rest of that row needs a little love seeing as Legacy of the Void is a marginal increase and Mind Spike is an outright DPS loss.

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It always worries me when Blizzard want to change something that has been a core part of the spec for... ever?

Looking at those Fire Mage comments makes me a little bit scared. Crit has always been a part of the spec and, for me at least, was one of the things that made it fun. Those big crits, procs flying everywhere. It was great.

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The pacing already peaks out at the end of Voidform. It just plateaus until you enter the next one.

This might be true but what this does for me is wait before re-entering voidform untill lingering insanity is (almost) ran out. to get maximum benefit from the haste on ym dots. I have to say I always hated it but it did yield me about 20-30k extra dps (on a total of 300-350k). it's nto much, but enough to make me wait before re-entering voidform.

this change is still a bad one though. it does resolve the waiting problem but it's gonna affect us much more than people tend to think.

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Were a newer raiding squad that feels we need some more like minded people for our raid team. I'm filling out my squad for mythic content and am currently looking for ranged DPS and healers especially. Any class is more then welcome to apply and or contact me in game. We like to have fun and enjoy our raids. We have a discord channel like everyone else and just want to push ourselves over the edge. That means I need you. We won't micro manage you or kick you from the guild cause your DPS is 10k short of what is expected at your Ilevel. We understand. It's all about improving. We believe in the whole being greater then the sum of the parts or whatever else non sense sounds enticing. Were a progression team and know heroic well. I'm just tired of pugs when I could have some guildmates instead. We will help you gear and get better. If you like PvP we have people for that as well.
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Patch 7.1.5 brings heavy changes to some classes and the developer team discusses with the community the latest class changes.
The latest class changes can be found here.
Hunter (Marksmanship)
Sigma
There's a lot to discuss here--some we agree with and some we don't--but I want to swing by at least on this specific observation. We agree we don't want a major breakpoint between 2 and 3 Aimed Shots after a Marked Shot (at least, not at a middling amount like 21% haste that will affect gear choice throughout the expansion). We're not decided on a fix yet; in particular, whether the standard amount should be two Aimed Shots after a Marked Shot, or three (if two, it would still be okay to have three during Bloodlust and similar situations). The ability would be tuned around whichever option. Two has some advantages like concentrating the Vulnerable burst more, requiring standing still for less time to fully utilize it, and potentially having enough leeway for an instant before one of the Aimed Shots.
(Source)
Monk (Windwalker)
Ornyx
Hey all,
Just to reiterate here (saw it brought up in the Live Q&A chat today), but we are aware of feedback regarding both Storm, Earth, and Fire and Serenity on the 7.1.5 PTR.
I don't have anything specific for this moment, but know that we've passed along notes on both of these skills to the development team. We will update you once we have more to share.
Thank you for a response - any response.
Please, though, don't let this be like what happened on the 7.1 ptr and the Demon Hunters, where we got this exact sort of message, and then silence. Last time, when that happened, I rerolled to monk. I'm so anxious it will happen yet again.
Not necessarily our goal, and I'm not saying we have any changes planned for these two skills within 7.1.5's PTR cycle (I am not sure what's on the plate there for further Monk changes), but I would like to at least work to get something shared on this, whether its a bit of philosophy or otherwise.
We have had some communication shortcomings over the past while, but we are trying something a bit new with our internal processes which should benefit us all in the long-term. :)
He also mentioned that they will be taking a look at Serenity, just as a note!
Edit: Here's a link to the portion of the Q&A where Ion and Josh talked about Storm, Earth, and Fire and Serenity.
(Source)
Shaman (Enhancement)
Lore
Boulderfist is intended as a talent choice that creates some gaps in your rotation, by replacing your no-cooldown resource builder with something that’s overall stronger, but has charges. In 7.1, the recharge time isn’t long enough for those gaps to ever actually happen, especially with the most popular Enhancement talent build adding several more active abilities to your rotation. Its power level was also simply too high, and in this case, we’d rather let this talent have its intended effect on the pace of your rotation and buff the spec as a whole to compensate.

Our intent is that if you want to use an ability every GCD, you should choose one of the other options in that row. Boulderfist should result in an overall more methodical pace that is more about having a little time to plan upcoming abilities. When Boulderfist is the hands-down best option in that row, that doesn’t feel like much of a choice, and as we continue tuning for 7.1.5, we hope to address this by bringing it in line with the others.
While I can appreciate that there was an original design intent behind Boulderfist, the spec as it currently exists on Live is as enjoyable to play as it's ever been since I rolled my Shaman back in BC.

We've heard it reiterated over and over (and over) again by the developers that if something about a spec felt too mandatory, it would just get rolled into the spec. I play this spec as my main because it is fun; if I cared strictly about maximum overall damage output, I'd focus on my Rogue instead. Changing a mechanic like this runs counter to the design philosophy that's been so oft repeated.
Thanks for all the feedback; this has been a consistent theme throughout the thread and elsewhere. And we don't want to disrupt the familiar playstyle of 7.1 Enhancement, if in fact the specific pacing of Boulderfist's recharge time is a major part of what makes it work so well. We will still have to address the power level in some way without diluting the feel that's been discussed here. We are currently planning the following for PTR (uncertain on timing):
Boulderfist recharge time back to 6 seconds
Boulderfist no longer gives a bonus to critical strike
Rockbiter generates 20 Maelstrom (from 15)
(Source)
Warlocks
Sigma
That's all fine and dandy, now get to work fixing warlocks.
Incidentally--Imp/Succubus/Voidwalker/Felhunter/Felguard all deal 20% more damage. Most of that was datamined normally, but in particular, the increase to Felguard's attack power likely was not (simply because it's something that happens server-side).

I can think of one other thing worth calling attention to for feedback/testing that may have been missed: Mark of the Ancient Priestess and Mark of the Distant Army should do noticeably more healing/damage and be more worth using. Some of the stat-based neck enchants were also increased, but that will be clear in tooltips. Hidden Satyr scales correctly with gear now as well, and may be slightly weaker, but for the most part the other enchants were buffed to roughly its level.
(Source)

Well, in the wake of Doubleagent and his 110 ding without leaving the Padaren start zone, we have another insane achievement: Cerli from The Maelstrom has maxed out his Unholy Artifact weapon, getting the final, 54th, trait unlocked after acquiring a total of 65 million artifact power. For those of you that may not be aware, after you finish up your 34 normal traits you get the bonus trait you can put another 20 points in. So that's 5 million for the normal upgrades and then another measly 60 until you're maxed. At this point that really is a VERY unholy weapon and you really could say it's devoured someone's life!

Go here the full event, click to 21 hours in.
As you'd imagine this took a lot of Mythic+ dungeons, 2067 completed in time, in fact, with 383 Darkheart Thicket, 818 Maw of Souls, 444 Court of Stars and then a meager number of clears for the other ones (64 VoW, 75 WoA, etc), and then there's probably a fair number of runs not completed in time to add to that! In case you were wondering, he has around 53 days played on level 110 and he actually already has 69 million AP at the moment.
All joking aside, congratulations to Cerli on this achievement and you can check out his stream here, so hop on there and say gz!